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Looking at secular books: the Brontes

The Brontes are never far away from our screens. Alongside Dickens, George Eliot and Austen, the works of these extraordinary three sisters are English Classics with a capital C. Directors tend to concentrate on the petticoats and passion, unrequited love and madwomen in attics, but on rereading a few of these stories, I’ve been struck by how central Christianity is to each of them.

It is not surprising really. William Grimshaw, the hugely passionate and effective curate of Haworth only died in 1763 (do read Faith Cook’s brilliant biography), and Patrick Bronte, father of Emily, Anne and Charlotte, took up the job in 1820. Patrick has been called an evangelical and their aunt, who looked after the family when their mother died, was known for her ‘Wesleyan tendencies’. This influence, combined with the romanticism of the period, the wild beauty of the moors and repeated bereavement in the family go a long way to explaining the tensions found within the Brontes’ works.

Lawful wife

In Jane Eyre, we see two examples of evangelical clergymen: Mr. Brocklehurst is a repellent hypocrite, and St. John Rivers, an earnest man who represses himself and oppresses others. But, contrary to what some critics would have us believe, Charlotte Bronte is far from rejecting an evangelical belief outright. Throughout the novel, Charlotte Bronte wrestles with what it means to be a Christian, what it means to forgive and to serve, and to deal with injustice. The ending, in which Rochester professes faith and the last words of Revelation are quoted, is read by some as an ironic rejection of the pious life, or as a sop to conventional readers, but I think it can be taken to sum up Jane’s satisfaction in her final role, as lawful wife of Rochester. Whether there is more law than grace here, more the ‘mighty spirit’ she senses than the reality of Christ, remains open to question. Do reread this book and think it out for yourself!

Uplifting romance

Anne Bronte’s work Agnes Grey is far simpler in form and in spirituality. The eponymous heroine battles as a governess in homes of spoiled and worldly children, who could be horrors from today’s Super Nanny programme. She falls in love with an evangelical curate and struggles with her own feelings until… At times the novel is homiletic, as we hear the curate deal with the doubts of one of his parishioners, but it is certainly never sanctimonious. Instead the novel is a thoroughly engaging and uplifting romance.

Forbidden love

Emily Bronte’s Wuthering Heights, with its forbidden love, seems a world away from polite governesses and curates. The gothic intensity and romanticism of the novel is amazingly executed, revealing the tension between convention and passion, seen in Jane Eyre, but with a very different result. Where is evidence of Emily’s upbringing here? There seems to be more pantheism here, and the only Scripture in evidence is found in the mouth of sour Joseph, the naysayer of it all. Emily Bronte lets us see that what thwarts the passion of Heathcliff and Cathy is not just decorum and cruel relatives, but their own self-destructive natures. Perhaps this is where we see the shadow of evangelicalism? For all the elevated passages about love, and the wild beauty of the moors which Emily Bronte exults in, untamed nature is doomed to destruction.

These comments are brief and don’t do justice to three great novels. Do read them and draw your own conclusions. Think, too, about the effect of the gospel in three brief lives, and their different reactions to the gospel.

Sarah Allen

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<< May 2007 >>